Socialism or Just Good Christianity? Gravity Payments, Happiness, and the Living Wage

Christianity Today has a good update article on Gravity Payments, the Seattle company that made national headlines when the CEO (Dan Price) decided to set a uniform salary for all employees–regardless of education and position in the company. From the janitor to the CEO, the salary will be $70,000. Price set that number when he read a study that suggested it to be a benchline income which predicts personal happiness.

Not surprisingly, the counter-cultural move created a buzz of both positive and negative feedback. On the negative front, some (including Rush Limbaugh), decried the move as socialism. But Weinhold (CT author) explains that it is not socialism, but reflects Christian principles:

Despite the concerns over the pay shift as socialism, Gravity Payments has every intention of continuing to operate as a business selling a service and making a profit. In fact, as a result of the recent publicity, several new clients have signed on. Dan Price and his company are practicing simple, straightforward, for-profit capitalism, not socialism.

Price’s move violates an understanding of capitalism that would require company to pay no more than the lowest price at which the market would allow them to hire appropriate workers. (Wal-Mart, to pick a prominent example, clearly operates on such a conviction.)

I once heard the (very wealthy) founder of a very successful midwest company complain that not enough people in the area were willing to accept the $10.00/hr factory jobs his company was offering. His company was looking for workers–but there were not enough interested–even though unemployment was high; some (many?) were presumably relying on government “handouts” instead. The CEO seemed to chalk it up to laziness or entitlement, or something. After I heard his complaint, I looked into what is considered a living wage in the area where his company is located. $10.00/hr would be a living wage for one adult. But when you add a dependent, it doubles (to over $22.00). Three dependents? It triples (to well over $30.00/hr). And we’re not talking anywhere close to Dan Price’s “happiness standard,” we’re just talking about adequate housing, health care, food on the table, etc.

It seems to me that more businesspeople who claim to uphold “biblical principles” and “family values” and so on, could consider Price’s counter-cultural example, take another look at the Bible, and then take a hard look at their own practices and values. Maybe it wouldn’t mean going nearly as “radical” as Gravity Payments, but just a step or two in that direction might make a huge difference. Maybe instead of asking, “how little can we pay and still get workers?” more CEOs could ask, “how much can we pay and still be sustainable as a company?” Granted, not every company can afford to even use the “living wage” as a criterion for salary. Maybe the “happiness factor” is a really good criterion for Christians to use. And who knows–it might make Jesus happy, too.

photo credit: <a href=”http://www.flickr.com/photos/32752902@N02/5098009591″>Faces in the crowd at the rally</a> via <a href=”http://photopin.com”>photopin</a> <a href=”https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/”>(license)</a>